Castle of Chaos and Haunted Forest

On yet another Smalley adventure, Brooke and Roger spent Saturday evening full of screams with KC up in Salt Lake at the Castle of Chaos, and then down in Lehi at the Haunted Forest. The Castle of Chaos is said to be one of the scariest haunted houses in the whole country, even featured on the Travel Channel. It was scary yes, but not to the extent we expected. For fun Roger wore his new heart rate monitor. He peaked at 145 during the 20 some minutes of excursion through the "castle." The Haunted Forest was much longer and outside, and seemed much scarier, despite a much lower max hr! Definitely more bang for your buck tho at the Haunted Forest! Very fun!

At the ticket booth for Haunted Forest - wow our lens needs cleaned!

These were probably more for kids, but we posed in them anyways!

This was the scene waiting in line to go through the door into the Haunted Forest. About an hour wait, tons of people, but they had some good entertainment to make the time go by faster.

Another shot of the entrance to the forest. They kept playing the Thriller video on the big screen, and it just happened to be playing when it was our turn to go in! Rockin out to that definitely made it seem less scary to start!

Right before we went in, we had the creepy vampire door guard take our picture. Apparantly vampires or whatever he was, don't know how to take very good pictures! Sorry KC!

Happy 1st Anniversary!

Oct 16 was our 1st Anniversary! We celebrated by going up to Murray (south of Salt Lake) to the one Cheesecake Factory in all of Utah! After our sealing last year in the Bellevue Temple, our families and us had dinner at the Cheesecake Factory there, and we love the place! It was a surprise for Brooke, but she finally figured out where we were going the night before, and she ended up being right! We had a great anniversary and are so happy to be married to each other!

At the Cheesecake Factor waiting for our food

This was all we had! - just kidding. Our Dutch Caramal Apple Struesel cheesecake dessert

Get it!

Fun times - thanks Cheesecake Factory

Sharing anniversary gifts that morning before work and school

Brooke and her gerber daisies :)

Brooke's 23rd Birthday!

Today, Oct 15, Brooke turned 23! Here's a few pics from opening presents when she got home from work that evening.

So instead of a birthday cake, Brooke got her favorite peach smoothie from Buns 'n Brews! Yum

Pumpkin Carving

In the spirit of Halloween we got a pumpkin and carved it with fancy toy carving tools!

4-Wheeling at Soapstone Basin

Today was yet another fun Saturday activity with the Smalley's: 4-Wheeling up at 8500 feet at Soapstone Basin (couple hours east of Provo). Despite a temperature of only 37 degrees, and even some snow in some areas, we had an AWESOME time roaming around the dirt roads.

Renae (who owns the 4-wheelers), Jadyn, Lindsay, KC, Brooke, Roger

Gettin ready for our first ride

We drove across the top of the pass and down to the other highway

On top of the pass, looking back out across the basin

Fun times in the VERY rough rode and snow! :)

Roger, near "camp roger" below the basin

We went to the zoo!

Last weekend we went to the Hogle Zoo up in Salt Lake! Earlier in September, Brooke also got a job as a Nanny, and the family who hired her invited us up there with them for Jadyn's 4th birthday. It was a beautiful, warm fall day, and we had a fun, full day seeing all the animals!

The two of us in front of the elephants

Roger and a giraffe

Hello penguins!

Baby Zuri with her mom

We love to bike!

Since arriving back in Provo we have gone on some beautiful fall bike rides. Hobble Creek is probably our favorite, but another one is out by West Mountain on the south end of Utah Lake. We had a wonderful Labor Day ride out there with our friends Dane and Bridget. It was a beautiful day for a 32 mile ride, and we had to stop part way through to get a picture!

Dane, Bridget, Brooke, Roger

*Summer Hiking*

We managed to do two huge hikes over the summer! One as soon as we got home to WA, and the other right before coming back to Provo. We hiked the 15.5 miles into Stehekin to surprise Roger's mom for her birthday in June (and then hiked back out a few days later!). In August, when Owen (Roger's brother) and his girlfriend Suzie came up from California, we did our second annual McGregor Mt. hike. This year though, we made it an overnight trip, and suffered the whole way up to camp. But the next morning the view at the top was well worth the pain and scary ascent. We definitely had a great, adventurous summer with family.

Near Rainy Pass at the trail head of Bridge Creek (into Stehekin)

Brooke, lookin good as we rest

Water anyone?

We made it! (Back at the car after another long day)

Roger, Brooke, Owen, Suzie - finally made it to camp at sunset - time for bed!

Sunrise as we crested the cliffs below the top of McGregor Mt

Bundled up at the top cause it was freezing!! (8122 feet)

Finally warming up as we headed back down to camp

This was our tent!

"out-house" with the best view ever